RATTLESNAKE HISTORY.

FROM the peculiar rattling appendage, with which this snake is armed, it has excited the notice of European explorers since the very first settlement of the American Continent. Whenever a traveller attempted any printed account of the New World and its products, mention was made of this ‘viper with the bell.’

By and by, in 1762, a live specimen was brought to England, where it arrested the attention of the members of the Royal Society and the scientific ‘Chirugions’ of the day.

From this time the rattlesnake began to be honoured with a literature of its own—one which equals if not exceeds in interest that of any other ophidian history handed down to us; for Cleopatra’s asp has its literature, and the Cobra capella, and M’Leod’s boa, and some few other distinguished ophidians, but none so voluminous and inexhaustible as the American Crotalus with its sonorous tail.

And despite the attention of naturalists for above two hundred years, it is not yet done with. First its rattle, then its fangs, next its maternal affection and the security offered to its young in ‘its own bosom,’ then its ‘pit,’ and again its rattle—each and all in turn have continued to occupy the pen of zoologists as, with the advance of science, fresh light has been thrown upon ophiology.

American naturalists have continually something new to tell us about the Crotalus, and not even yet have they decided among themselves of what precise use that remarkable rattle is, either to its owner or its auditors.

The various theories regarding its construction, mode of growth, its age and supposed uses, will occupy the second part of the present subject; other rattlesnake features will come in their places, but first an outline of what the early English writers had to say about it will not be devoid of interest.

Natural history as a science was then in its infancy. The Royal Society of England had as yet no existence; snakes were ‘insects,’ because they lay eggs; insects were ‘serpents,’ because they creep; and the majority of all such ‘creeping things’ were ‘venomous,’ of course.

In those early days of science there was little or no recognition of species, two, or at most three, different kinds of rattlesnakes being named. The distinguishing rattle seemed enough to separate them from all other snakes: they were ‘the vipers with the bell,’ or ‘the vipers with the sounding tail.’ ‘Vipers’ they were at once decided to be, conformably with the old idea that vipers, in distinction to every other kind of snake, produced their young alive. In this respect those early observers were correct; and from their general characteristics they are still vipers in the eyes of science: that is, they belong to the sub-order Viperina, though their dentition more than any other feature separates them from the rest, and we know now that several non-venomous snakes produce live young as well as the vipers.

In appearance the rattlesnake is so well known that a minute description of it is uncalled for. Throughout the whole genera of the CrotalidÆ the viperine character is seen in the broad, angular, flattish head; the thinner neck, distinct between it and the thicker body; a short, tapering tail, and a generally repulsive appearance with an evil expression about it, as if no further warning were required to announce its deadly qualities.

Nevertheless, many of the rattlesnakes possess an undeniably handsome exterior. Their colours are for the most part dark and rich, relieved with lighter markings and velvety black; often wearing a brilliant prismatic hue, which still further enriches their tints. And then the rattle at once announces the name of its owner.

It is not easy to decide on the writer or traveller from whom we get the first mention of the rattlesnake, which has an extensive geographical range on both the American continents. It was undoubtedly some South American explorer early in the sixteenth century, and long before any settlement in the New World had been made by the English.

In a rare old book, the first edition of which was published in London, 1614, viz. ‘Samvel Purchas. His Pilgrimage in all Ages; being an account of all the Places discovered since the Creation of the World,’ we hear of many Spanish and Portuguese authors who are but little known in England, and from each and all of whom the indefatigable ‘Pilgrim’ has culled information. Indeed, the book is a careful compilation from all the previous writers of any worth, though those only who mentioned the Brazilian serpents need be here introduced to the reader. These, in describing some unchanging peculiarities, and in giving us the vernacular names then common, have been of much use in assisting subsequent writers to identify certain species.

Hakluyt, Hernandez, Master Anthony Kniuet, and many others are quoted by Purchas, but of them all, ‘No man hath written so absolute a Discourse of Brazil as was taken from a Portugall Frier and sold to Master Hakluit,’ he tells us; giving at the same time a history of the persecution and imprisonment of this unfortunate friar, whose unusual intelligence seems to have rendered him an object of suspicion. Thus do we who come after benefit by the misfortunes of our predecessors, and thus has the stolen ‘Discourse’ of the sixteenth century been turned to account for our edification in the nineteenth.

In the Portuguese friar’s description of animals, it is not difficult to separate the true snakes from the ‘Serpentes with foure Legges and a Taile,’ or to identify the rattlesnakes among them. Says the writer, ‘The Boycininga is a Snake called of the Bell: it is of a great Poison, but it maketh such a Noise with a Bell it hath in its Tayle that it catcheth very few: though it be so swift that they call it the flying Snake. His Length is twelve or thirteen Spannes long. There is another Boycininpeba. This also hath a Bell, but smaller. It is blacke and very venomous.’

These two may be Crotalus horridus and Crotalus durissus, the two commonest; or they may be only one species of a different size, age, and colouring—a confusion which frequently occurs with even more recent and more scientific worthies than the good ‘Pilgrim’ Purchas. In a later edition he says: ‘Other Serpents there are that carrie upon the Tippe of their Tayle a certaine little roundelle, like a Bell, which ringeth as they goe.’

Marcgrave, in his Travels in Brazil, 1648, further helps us to label the right snake with the long vernaculars by figuring a rattlesnake and calling it by the same name, only with an additional syllable, Boicinininga, quem Cascavel, the latter euphonious Spanish word, for a little round bell, having widely obtained ever since.

As soon as the first English colony was settled in North America, the rattlesnake again comes upon the stage. Captain John Smith, whom we may call the founder of Virginia (since it was owing to his good judgment, endurance, and intelligence that the colony did not share the fate of Sir W. Raleigh’s adventurers), tells us of the ornaments worn by the Indians, and the favour in which certain Rattells were held by them as amulets. In his Generall Historie of Virginia, 1632, Captain Smith describes their barbarous adornments,—birds’ claws, serpent skins, feathers with a ‘rattell’ tied on to them, which ‘Rattells they take from the Taile of a Snake,’ and regard with superstitious veneration.

With the spirit of enterprise which marked that era, and the discovery of new countries and strange creatures, ‘Natural History’ began to be a recognised science in Europe. Aldrovanus and Gesner had produced their ponderous tomes, and the authors quoted by Purchas were eagerly read by Ingenious Chirugions, who in England appear to have taken the lead in science; while at Florence an assembly of ‘Knowing Physicians’ were experimentalizing with all the Vipers procurable in Southern Europe, holding council as to the source of their ‘Mischiefs’ and specific ‘Remedies for their Bitings,’ etc., with just such tests with the ‘Master Teeth’ of both living and dead vipers as have of late again occupied the attention of living scientists. In 1660 the learned Redi of Florence published his book on Vipers, and soon after M. Moyse Charas, a Frenchman, produced a work which would not be a bad textbook even now.

And for the Scientific World what greater stimulus could arise than the foundation of the ROYAL SOCIETY by Charles II., and the channel for ventilating discoveries and inventions which their published Transactions afforded? Very early in these do we find that viper poison was engaging professional attention, and soon did communications appear from those ‘knowing physicians’ at Florence. A correspondence sprang up between M.D.’s of England, France, and Italy; and the details of their experiments proved very inciting to the members of the Royal Society of London, who with the limited subjects at their disposal—virtually only our own little English viper—also set themselves to work to analyze the ‘Poyson Bag.’

One enthusiast, Mr. Platt, addressing the Royal Society from Florence, with an account of some of the experiments then going on, made mention of the M. Charas who had written such an important work, and ended by hoping to animate the virtuosi here to ‘do something that may be not unworthy your knowlege.’[77]

That the work of M. Moyse Charas was translated into English the following year, proves that the English virtuosi had really become ‘animated’ in the looked-for direction.[78]

In the preface of his book we read: ‘If Reflexion be made on the many Wonders that are found in the Body of this Animal’ (the viper), ‘it will be easily granted that it cannot be inquir’d into with too much Exactness: and that it is not a Work that can be finish’t at one or two Sittings.’

This little digression from the rattlesnake is not without its object; for from this correspondence through the Philosophical Transactions we may date the birth of ophiological science in England; and the reader will be able to place himself on that standpoint in order to reciprocate the kind of interest with which such an entirely strange and as yet unknown serpent as a rattlesnake was received a short time afterwards.

In vol. x. 1676, there is ‘An Account of Virginia, its Situation, Temperature,’ etc., communicated by Mr. Thomas Glover, ‘an ingenious Chirugion that hath lived some years in the Country.’

This gentleman tells us of the climate and productions of the new colony, not omitting those of the animal and vegetable kingdoms; among the various strange creatures which he describes in the crude language of the time are five or six sorts of snakes, amongst which ‘the Rattlesnake is the most remarkable, being about the bigness of a Man’s Legg, and for the most part a yard and a half long. He hath a Rattle at the End of his Tail, wherewith he maketh a Noise when any one approacheth nigh him: which seemeth to be a peculiar Providence of God to warn People to avoid the Danger; for this Creature is so venomous that the Bite of it is of most dangerous Consequence, unless they make use of the proper Antidote, of which I shall take occasion to speak somewhat hereafter.’

Such accounts, coupled with the interest awakened in the members of the Royal Society by the Florentine experimentalists, caused the first arrival of a rattlesnake in England to be a grand era in ophiological annals; and with its eventful appearance began its scientific history.

The published records of the Philosophical Transactions again perpetuate the impressions it created, and also many collateral points of interest.

A paper entitled Vipera Caudisona Americana; or, The Anatomy of a Rattle-Snake, was read by Dr. Edward Tyson, of the Royal Medical College of London, in 1683; who dissected one at the repository of the Royal Society in Jan. 1682. (The above scientific name is erroneously attributed to Laurenti, 1768.)

That nothing of much value to science was previously known about the reptile we gather from Dr. Tyson’s introductory words. ‘It were mightily to be wisht that we had the most compleat account of so Curious an Animal. This which we Dissected was sent to Mr. Henry Loades, a merchant in London, from Virginia, who was pleased not only to gratify the Curiosity of the Royal Society, in showing it them alive, but likewise gave it them when dead.’

Thus did Mr. Loades unconsciously immortalize himself in the history of rattlesnakes. Merchants in those days were not F.Z.S.’s; and it is probable that he thought of nothing beyond ingratiating himself with the members of a learned Society by presenting them with a ‘serpente’ dead, whose ‘Bell’ had excited their curiosity when living; and he little dreamed that the origin and use of this strange bell would not be determined two hundred years afterwards.

Says Dr. Tyson: ‘I find the inward parts so conformable to those of a Viper that I have taken the liberty of placing it in that Classe and (since it has not that I know of any Latine Name) of giving it that of Vipera Caudisona: for as I am informed by Merchants ‘tis Viviparous, and the Epithet sufficiently differences it from those that have no Rattle.’

This scholarly anatomist had evidently devoted much careful labour to the task of hunting up all the literature that could throw any light on his much-prized specimen. He had no doubt been one of those ‘animated’ by the Florentine savants, and had made himself acquainted with all the viperine characters. He had doubtless read all that had already appeared in the Philosophical Transactions, and also the narratives of such voyageurs as Hakluyt, Hernandez, Piso, and Marcgravius.

Among the useful results of his researches he is able to give us many, we may say most, of its vernaculars in the countries of the New World settled by Europeans up to that date; and as in subsequent books of travel we hear of the rattlesnake frequently under these vernaculars, until, as of later years, its ordinary English name has been familiar to all, we have had a good deal to thank him for, were it only this.

In addition to the authors already named, he gives us Guliemus Piso, Johnston, Merembergius, and ‘others that have wrot of it, and its anatomy, under the names of Boigininga or Boiginininga and Boiquira, which are its Brazile Names. By the Portuguese it is called Casca vela and Tangador: by the Dutch, Raetel Sclange; by those of Mexico, Teutlaco-cauehqui or Teuhtlacotl zauhqui, i.e. Domina Serpentum: and from its swift motion on the Rocks like the wind, Hoacoatl.’

Minutely and scientifically was that ‘viper with the sounding tail’ dissected and studied out by Dr. Tyson just two hundred years ago; and the excellent illustrations with which his description was elucidated were subsequently used in many first-class physiological works.

Not even the ‘pit’ escaped the notice of that nice anatomist,—the ‘nasal fosse,’ or ‘sort of second nostril,’ as it was for a long while called,—and its use conjectured, and which has given to a very large group of venomous serpents the name of ‘pit vipers,’ the peculiar orifice not being confined to the American Crotalus alone (see chap. xxi.).

‘Between the nostrils and eyes are two other orifices which at first I took to be Ears,’ he tells us, speaking of this ‘pit,’ ‘but after found they only led into a Bone that had a pretty large cavity, but no perforation.’ He had seen that vipers—the European vipers which he had previously known—had not these orifices. Then he comments on the great Provision of Nature in furnishing the strong, smooth ‘belly scales,’ (see illustration, p. 193), and the ‘very long trachea of 20 inches. Nature is mightily provident in supplying them with Air, in bestowing on them so large a Receptacle for receiving it.’

Tyson quotes from the ‘contests between the noble Italian Redi, and the Frenchman M. Charas,’ as to the source of the poison in vipers, and makes discoveries for himself, as for instance the mobility of the jaw in elevating and depressing the fang, the structure of the teeth, and various other matters which in this book are discussed in their several chapters, but which were then for the first time scientifically described in English by Tyson.

True that a little traditional gossip about the rattle, which he had gathered from less competent sources, creeps in towards the conclusion of the paper. While the learned M.D. writes from his own observations and scientific knowledge, he affords valuable information; and we can dispense with the hearsay of the day. However, all honour be to Dr. Tyson of two hundred years ago, who was the first to give us ‘The Anatomy of the Rattlesnake,’ and its first scientific name.

As the two American continents became more widely known to Europeans, and Englishmen were seized with a desire to visit the new colonies, books of travels and descriptions multiplied too rapidly for even a passing mention in these pages; though wherever the slightest approach to natural history was included, the rattlesnake figured conspicuously. Of those works frequently quoted by naturalists, Seba’s Rerum Naturalium Thesauri in 1735, of four ponderous volumes, containing text in both Latin and French, and profusely illustrated, must not be omitted, though about the Crotalus he has not much new to tell us. He quotes Tyson and others, and explains that the many nearly similar names are ‘selon la difference de prononciation des Bresiliens, qui la nomme aussi Boiquira;’ and he thinks all these names ‘ne dÉsignent qu’une seule et mÊme vipÈre.’ To these various titles of ‘one and the same viper,’ we shall refer again in chap. xxiii. To the list he adds that the English call it ‘rattlesnake;’ the French, ‘serpent À sonnettes;’ and Latin authors, Anguis crotalophorus (or the rattle-bearing snake). He also gives us another Mexican name, ‘Ecacoatl, qui signifie le Vent, parce qu’elle rampe avec une extrÈme vitesse sur les rochers.’

This extreme activity in the rattlesnake is not in accordance with our alien experience. Still we hear of it from more than one writer and in widely separated habitats. The Mexican and Brazilian words may have alluded to the rapidity of motion in striking its prey, and which in its swiftness can scarcely be followed. Or it is possible that the reptile which as a captive in our chilling climate is so slow and sluggish, may, when stimulated by a tropical sun and under peculiar excitement, occasionally exhibit a vivacity incredible to us who see it only in menageries. Regarding other species of viperine snakes, we have sometimes similar evidence; and there is nothing in the structure of the Crotalus to contradict it.

One more of the unpronounceable Mexican names we must inflict on the reader, to show how this serpent was distinguished among all others even in length of title. F. Fernandez, or Hernandez, in his Animalium Mexicanum, p. 63, A.D. 1628, calls it Teuchlacotzauhqui, because it surpasses all others in ‘l’horrible bruit de sa sonnette.’

As may be supposed, anybody who could see this remarkable snake on its native soil was ready to tell something about it; and from the time that Dr. Tyson dissected his specimen and made it better known to the ‘Curious,’ many other communications saw light through the pages of the Philosophical Transactions during the next few years.

In experimenting to discover the source of the ‘mischief,’ one skilful ‘Chyrurgeon’ proved that the gall of vipers is not venomous, only bitter.

A Mr. John Clayton, in an Account of the Beasts in Virginia, 1694, tells us the rattlesnake’s ‘Tayle is composed of perished Joynts like a dry Husk. The Old shake and shiver these Rattles with wonderful Nimbleness; the Snake is a Majestick sort of Creature, and will scarce meddle with anything unless provoked.’ He also describes the ‘fistulous Teeth’ and the poison being injected through these ‘into the very mass of the blood.’ Effective remedies are spoken of, as if not much doubt of a cure existed. An Indian was bitten in the arm, who ‘clapt a hot burning coal thereon and singed it stoutly.’

In Italy experiments still went on, and a Mr. C. J. Sprengle wrote to the Royal Society from Milan (1722), that in a room opened at the top were sixty vipers from all parts of Italy. ‘Whereupon we catch’d some mice and threw them in, one at a time, among all that number of vipers; but not one concerned himself about the mice, only one pregnant viper who interchanged eyes with the mouse, which took a turn or two, giving now and then a squeak, and then ran with great swiftness into the chops of the viper, where it gradually sunk down the gullet.’ And from this sinister proceeding on the part of the viper, Mr. Sprengle argues a fact generally borne out in zoological collections ever since, namely, that venomous snakes in captivity will not eat until they become reconciled.

And so by degrees these many interesting ophiological facts have been worked out and established. In 1733, vol. xxxviii., some experiments made by Sir Hans Sloane are recorded. A dog was made to tread on a rattlesnake which bit him. In one minute of time the dog was paralytic in the hinder legs, and was dead in less than three minutes.

Another subject of subsequent interest and even importance was some observations made by Sir Hans Sloane on the ‘Charms, Inchantments, or Fascinations of Snakes,’ in reply to communications by Paul Dudley, Esq., F.R.S., and Col. Beverley, both of whom believed that the rattlesnake could bring a bird or a squirrel from a tree into their mouths by the power of their eye.

A word on fascination will come in its place, but as a part of rattlesnake history Sir Hans Sloane may be quoted here. And yet a reason so long ago suggested by him, who thoughtfully watched a snake, seems almost entirely to have escaped notice. He thinks ‘the whole mystery of charming or enchanting any Creature is simply this. Small Animals or Birds bitten, the poison allows them time to run a little way (as perhaps a bird to fly up into a tree), where the snakes watch them with great earnestness, till they fall down, when the snakes swallow them.’[79]

Sir Hans Sloane quotes a good deal from the work by Colonel Beverley,[80] and the observations made by him; particularly one which the author remarks is a ‘curiosity which he never met with in print,’ viz. the instinct which displays itself so strongly after death in the rattlesnake. A man chopped off the head and a few inches of the neck of a rattlesnake, and then on touching the ‘springing teeth with a stick, the head gave a sudden champ with its mouth,’ thus displaying the impulse to bite. He noticed the action of the springing teeth ‘when they are raised, which I take to be only at the will of the snake to do mischief.’ Strange to tell, many of the above peculiarities have been described as ‘new to science’ within forty years.

But among those who wrote of our American colonies, Lawson must not be omitted. Describing the ‘Insects of Carolina,’ viz. alligators, rattlesnakes, water snakes, swamp snakes, frogs, great loach, lizards, worms, etc., he tells us what was then new about the subject of this chapter.

‘The Rattlesnakes are found on all the Main of America that I ever had any Account of: being so called from the Rattle at the End of their Tails, which is a Connexion of jointed Coverings of an excrementitious Matter, betwixt the Substance of a Nail and a Horn, though each Tegment is very thin. Nature seems to have designed these on purpose to give Warning of such an approaching Danger as the venomous Bite of these Snakes is. Some of them grow to a very great Bigness, as six Feet in Length; their Middle being the Thickness of the Small of a lusty Man’s Leg. They are of an orange, tawny, and blackish Colour on the Back, differing (as all Snakes do) in Colour on the Belly; being of an Ash Colour inclining to Lead. The Male is easily distinguished from the Female by a black Velvet Spot on his Head; and besides his Head is smaller-shaped and long. Their Bite is venomous if not speedily remedied; especially if the Wound be in a Vein, Nerve, Tendon, or Sinew, when it is very difficult to cure. The Indians are the best Physicians for the Bite of these, and all other venomous Creatures of this Country. The Rattle-Snakes are accounted the peaceablest in the World, for they never attack any One or injure them unless trodden upon or molested. The most Danger of being bit by these Snakes is for those that survey Land in Carolina; yet I never heard of any Surveyor that was killed or hurt by them. I have myself gone over several of this Sort; yet it pleased God I never came to any Harm. They have the Power or Art (I know not which to call it) to charm Squirrels, Hares, Partridges, or any such Thing, in such a Manner that they run directly into their Mouths. This I have seen,’ and so forth.... ‘Rattle-Snakes have many small Teeth of which I cannot see they make any Use; for they swallow every Thing whole; but the Teeth which poison are only four; two on each side of their Upper-Jaws. These are bent like a Sickle, and hang loose, as if by a Joint. Towards the setting on of these, there is in each Tooth a little Hole, wherein you may just get in the Point of a small Needle. And here it is that the Poison comes out and follows the Wound made by the Point of their Teeth. They are much more venomous in the Months of June and July than they are in March, April, or September. The hotter the Weather the more poisonous. Neither may we suppose they can renew their Poison as oft as they will; for we have had a Person bit by one of these who never rightly recovered it, and very hardly escaped with Life; and a second Person bit in the same Place by the same Snake and received no more Harm than if bitten with a Rat. They cast their Skins every Year and commonly abide in the Place where the old Skin lies. These cast Skins are used for Physick, and the Rattles are reckoned good to expedite the Birth.’ ... ‘Gall mixed with Clay and made into Pills are kept for Use and accounted a noble Remedy.’ ... ‘This Snake has two Nostrils on each Side its Nose. Their Venom I have Reason to believe effects no Harm any otherwise than when darted into the Wound by the Serpent’s Teeth.’

This description, being an early and excellent illustration of what has since been termed ‘Practical Natural History,’ is given at length, and because Lawson has been a good deal quoted by subsequent writers.

So again is Catesby, who went to Virginia in 1712, staying seven years ‘to gratify a passionate desire to view animal and vegetable productions in their native country.’ He was the first to figure and to describe two distinct species. It is admitted that he did much for natural history, and his drawings are by far the best that had as yet appeared. Catesby therefore claims a conspicuous place among rattlesnake historians.

By this time, 1731, nine or ten of the American colonies had celebrated their first centenary, and had made considerable advances towards civilisation. In the parts visited by Catesby a good deal of the old English refinement marked the character and manners of the people. But a little domestic incident in the house where he was staying is related by him, and affords us an insight of a less attractive character in plantation life.

The largest rattlesnake Catesby ever saw was eight feet long, and weighed eight or nine pounds. ‘This Monster was gliding into the House of Col. Blake, and had certainly taken up his Abode there undiscovered, had not the Domestic Animals alarmed the Family with their repeated Outcries: the Hogs, Dogs, and Poultry united in their Hatred to him, showing the greatest Consternation by erecting their Bristles and Feathers, and showing their Wrath and Indignation surrounded him; but carefully kept their Distance, while he, regardless of their Threats, glided slowly along.’

It was not at all an uncommon occurrence for rattlesnakes to come into houses at that time, nor indeed has it been long since then in secluded parts.

Catesby himself had a narrow escape once, when he occupied a room on the ground floor, and a rattlesnake was found snugly coiled in his bed.

Notwithstanding a growing acquaintance with the rattlesnake among the F.R.S.’s, to the general public it was still almost unknown.

Even in the middle of the eighteenth century an itinerant exhibitor could say what he pleased about it to a too credulous public. An extract from an old newspaper suggests an ancestral Barnum joining hands with a journalist to make a fortune out of one thus exhibited. Not so much was expected of journalists in those days; but even now, so far as snakes are concerned, a vast number of errors creep into newspapers.

‘A BEAUTIFUL RATTLESNAKE ALIVE.

‘This exotic Animal is extremely well worthy the Observation of the Curious: Its Eyes are of great Lustre, even equal to that of a Diamond, and its Skin so exquisitely mottled and of such surpassing Beauty as baffles the Art of the most celebrated Painter: It is about five Feet long, and so sagacious, that it will rattle whenever the Keeper commands it: There is not the least cause for Fear, though it were at Liberty in the Room: but that the Ladies may be under no Apprehension on that Account, it is kept in a Glass-Case. It is very Active, and is the first ever shown alive in England.’—From The General Advertiser, LONDON, Sat., Jan. 4th, 1752.

Any ‘sagacity’ displayed in this exhibition was on the part of the keeper, who had discovered the exceeding timidity of this reptile, and had observed that it used its rattle whenever alarmed or provoked. However, the timidity answered very well for obedience, and no doubt drew many spectators.

A notable feature in the rattlesnake was its fecundity and prevalence.

This we gather from all who in the early days of American history had anything to tell us of the country and its inhabitants. Whether the subject of their pen were Topography, Indians, or Productions, a rattlesnake crept in. Collateral evidence of this kind, given with no motive for exaggeration, nor even as ‘natural history,’ may therefore be accredited.

A slaughter of rattlesnakes was as much an annual custom as the slaughter of hogs. Regularly as a crop of hay came a crop of rattlesnakes. On account of the oil manufactured from their fat, the slaughter partook also of a commercial character; but more commonly it was a war of extinction, like the battles with the Indians. Usually an annual, frequently a biennial, crusade was undertaken, the settlers being well acquainted with their habits and retreats. It was a well-known fact that, towards the close of summer, and on the first indication of frost, the reptiles returned simultaneously and in vast numbers to a favourite spot. Not only hundreds but thousands make for this winter rendezvous year after year.

Catlin, the Indian historian, tells us that near Wilkesbarre, in Pennsylvania, his birth-place, was a cavern in the mountains called Rattlesnake Den; and to this cavern the snakes made an annual pilgrimage, collecting from vast distances, no matter what obstacles were in their way. Across rivers and lakes, and up mountain sides, straight to their Den they would go, and in those unapproachable caverns lie en masse in a torpid state until aroused by the coming summer, when they would venture forth again and descend into the valleys.

These were the times for the grand battues, one of which, an event of Catlin’s boyhood, is narrated by him.

One of the first spring days, when the creatures creep out to sun themselves for only a few hours, retiring again at night, was the time chosen for the onslaught. The snakes were known to come forth from Rattlesnake Den on to a certain ledge of rock near their cavern; and a council of war was held as to the best approach and mode of attack. Ten years previously a similar war had been waged, when the reptiles had been almost exterminated; but of late so many accidents had occurred among the inhabitants through the fast-increasing serpents, that the farmers agreed to climb to the den and once more reduce their numbers. The boy Catlin was privileged to be of the party, and he was told to creep cautiously to an overhanging rock, whence he could see the reptiles sunning themselves on their ledge below. The rest of the party stood in readiness, club in hand. At a signal young Catlin fired a fowling-piece into their midst. There was a knot of them ‘like a huge mat wound and twisted and interlocked together, with all their heads like scores of hydras standing up from the mass.’ Into this horrible cluster he ‘let fly,’ when the party, rushing with their clubs, broke the spine of hundreds by a single blow to each, while hundreds more were saving themselves by a quick return to their den.

While counting the five or six hundred slain, and holding another council of war on the battle-field, a rattle was heard of one which in the death-struggle had escaped over a ledge instead of into its cave. With a forked stick a man approached that misguided reptile and held down its head, while another brave expert seized it by the neck so close to its head that it could not turn and bite him.

It was a very large snake, and young Catlin, inspired by the sudden thought, exclaimed, ‘Tie a powder-horn to its tail and fasten a slow fuse to it, and let it go back into its den.’

‘George, you are the best hunter in the Valley of Ocquago!’ cried the man who held the snake; and forthwith the plan was agreed upon.

The largest powder-horn in the party was filled to the brim from the other horns, and tied to the snake’s tail by a string of several feet long; and to the horn was fixed a slow fuse of about a yard in length, made of wetted, twisted tow, in which gunpowder was rolled. This accomplished while the reptile was still firmly held, it was then set free close to the mouth of its den, the whole party speedily escaping to a safe distance.

Listening, they heard the horn rattling over the rocky floor as the snake was carrying it home into the midst of its comrades, when, after the silence of a minute or so, an explosion like a clap of thunder shook the ground on which they stood, and blue streams issued forth between the crevices around the den, and a thick volume from its mouth.

Rattlesnake Den was thus cleared of its inhabitants for many long years.

Catlin affirms that the Valley of the Wyoming used to be more infested with these terrible pests than any other portion of the globe. Every summer the lives of persons as well as cattle were destroyed by them, and the ‘happy little valley’ would have been rendered uninhabitable but for the periodical battues.[81]

Howe in his Histories of Ohio and of Virginia relates many similar facts. A Mr. Stone, one of the first settlers of the ‘Western Reserve’ along the shore of Lake Erie, has immortalized himself as a slayer of rattlesnakes. They were ‘in great plenty along the track,’ and he being the first to ‘survey’ the land in 1796, had the honour of doing battle with them. In Trumbull County they abounded. One year, about the first of May 1799, a large party armed with cudgels proceeded to a sunny level of rock on which hosts of the reptiles had crept. Approaching cautiously, step by step, the enemy came upon them suddenly, and then began to cudgel with all their might. Hot and furious was the fight; the rattles were ringing as the snakes beat a retreat up the hill, and the ground was strewed with the slain: four hundred and eighty-six were that day collected, most of them over five feet in length.

In another of these spring campaigns eight hundred rattlesnakes were killed, including a few of their relatives the copper-head, and hundreds more of harmless snakes of which the slayers ‘took no account.’

Holbrooke records that once in New York State two men in three days killed 1104 rattlesnakes on an eastern slope of Tongue mountain.

Many hairbreadth escapes during these adventures form the subjects of exciting stories in the domestic annals of American settlers, but are becoming more and more histories of the past. In many localities where formerly rattlesnakes swarmed, they have almost totally disappeared or have become very rare. Probably with their friends the Indians, they will in time become wholly extinct.

New species have, however, been discovered by the explorers of the new Western States and in Tropical America, where, in the sparsely-settled districts, they still come into houses as of yore, and where the rattlesnake campaign is still an annual sport for the venturesome pioneers. In 1872, two thousand of the species Crotalus confluentus were killed in the Yellowstone Region.

One other question in the history of the rattlesnake—‘Does it swallow its young in times of danger?’ or more correctly speaking, ‘Does it receive its young into its oesophagus as a place of safety?’—is considered in chap. xxvii.

Other discussions of modern times, both in assemblies of zoologists and through printed correspondence, have been on the rattle, when and why vibrated, how affected by damp, etc., all claiming a place in rattlesnake history, but considered elsewhere in this work. A whole volume might be written on this rattling tail, evolved out of the scant materials of the sixteenth century into the prolific matter of the nineteenth. You can scarcely take up one of the many scientific journals of the United States, in which zoology forms a part, without finding mention of a rattlesnake. Within a very few years the subject has been popularized in our own zoological journals also.

In connection with the venom come of course the cures, concerning which the experiments of Dr. Weir Mitchell form a notable point in rattlesnake history. But serpent venom and its remedies, so far as lies within my province to discuss them, come also in a special chapter.

In concluding this one, I will roughly enumerate the species of rattlesnakes now best known. We have seen that formerly only one or two different kinds were noticed, and the subsequent multiplication of species is due almost as much to science and to a more careful observation of the distinguishing features, as to the discovery of absolutely new ones.

The frequent Exploring Expeditions fitted out by the United States Government for Geographical Boundaries, Pacific Railroads, Geological Surveys, etc., with always a zoologist on their Staff of Scientific Men, have added much to our knowledge of natural history; and in the Reports and Bulletins of these may be sifted out information in every branch of Science. Thus in Crotalus chronicles, our two original rattlesnakes have increased and are still increasing. In 1831, the late Dr. J. E. Gray, of the British Museum Natural History Department, enumerated six genera and eleven species belonging to America. In 1860, Dr. Weir Mitchell gave about twenty species as belonging to two genera only, and distinguished by their head scales.

As this book has no scientific pretensions, and as its aim is rather to interest a large class of readers than systematically to instruct the few, I will not attempt a list of genera and species with all their perplexing names, if indeed a true list of all the now known species even exist. They are distinguished by the shields or plates on the head, and by the varying tails. Some have rattles so small as barely to entitle them to the name of Crotalus.

Then, again, a new name is frequently adopted by the discoverer of a new feature; and a number of American genera, minus a rattle altogether, are included among the CrotalidÆ, an anomaly which will be presently explained. Here we have to do with only the rattlesnake proper, viz. the ‘Viper with the Bell,’ Vipera caudisona of Tyson, and the Crotalus of LinnÆus.

This word Crotalus, simply a rattle, from the Greek word crotalon, and the Latin crotalia and crotalum, a kind of castanets, is as suitable as any that could possibly have been assigned to the snake; and most of the generic names are compounds of it: Crotalophorus, rattle-bearing; Crotalina, little rattle; CrotaloidÆ; Urocrotalon, rattling tail; or simply Crotalus. Then the specific name more especially describes the snake in colour, size, character, locality, etc., as Oregonus, from Oregon; Kirtlandii, from Dr. Kirtland of Ohio, who first described that species; horridus, from the hideous, terrible character of this large snake; miliarius, a very small one; caudisona, sounding tail; and so on.

Their geographical range is from about 45° north, to the Gulf of Mexico, Texas, and southward; and in South America to about the same degree of climate and temperature as in the northern latitudes. They are most virulent in the hottest seasons, the tropical regions, and according to their size; though, as is the case with other venomous snakes, a small species in hot weather and with a large store of venom may be more noxious than the largest in a half-torpid state and with a small supply of venom.

There is one known as the ‘Prairie rattlesnake;’ another frequents the marshy districts of Ohio; another, the swamps of the Southern States along the coast; a fourth is known as the ‘Western rattlesnake;’ some of the 20 species described in the United States being more abundant in the mountainous regions, others near the rivers.

In the wilder regions of Central and South America they also abound; but less is known of them where there are no United States Exploring Expeditions to record them.